dinsdag 14 februari 2017

Dutch exports of dual-use satellites in 2016

More
and more small satellites are launched into space. A tenth of them
has a clear military function. The Dutch
Association for the Aerospace (NVR) in 2011 published a magazine
dedicated to small satellites and the Dutch activities in this area.
The Netherlands is not an insignificant party in this market.

Those
small satellites can be used for many purposes. The KVR notes:

"Global
forces can not do without satellites for a variety of purposes such
as communication, navigation, surveillance and intelligence. Command,
guidance of weapons, weather forecasts and similar issues are
dependent on information obtained through satellites. Military
satellites increase the effectiveness of existing defence systems.
Small satellites are becoming increasingly important because of many
advantages such as the possibility of rapid development of new
satellites for specific purposes."

Satellites
have become indispensable for military deployment.

The
Dutch government is one of the most transparent in Europe when it
comes to providing information on the export and transit of strategic
goods. Strategic goods are military and dual-use (civil and military,
DU) goods.

Recently,
the
new DU-list was published. In a table, of about 7,000 lines,
exports for the period 2004-2016 are given. Striking is the large
number of satellite exports in 2016. Until 2016 are just a few
permits issued for (weather) satellites and components (including
optical technology and undefined components). The destinations were
China, India and South Korea.

Formal ISILaunch17 mission logo of February 2017

The
significant increase in 2016 is mainly due to the export of nano
satellites. These are sometimes not be greater than a milk
carton to the size of a
refrigerator and are brought into the room with a rocket. The
Netherlands
Aerospace Centre (NLR) in
Amsterdam is in charge of Dutch investigation into the application,
but the Technical
University Delft, the
Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific
Research (TNO)
and smaller – but not insignificant - companies such as ISIS
and Cosine are also involved in
that development.

The
market for
satellites is divided into several segments, such as
communications, surveillance, observation, scientific research,
biological experiments, testing and demonstration of technology,
science and navigation. Based on end-user, the following parties are
distinguished: government, society, industry, defence, energy, marine
and transportation industries.

The
bulk of the Dutch satellite exports in 2016 relates to nano
satellites for observation. Both military and science and industry
benefit from this. Observation may be intended to improve the growing
of crops, but also to identify opponents, possibly in preparation for
an attack or a targeted elimination of people. The military or
repressive applications are the controversial when discussing the
export of strategic products.

The
reputation of the countries (China, Russia, India, Israel, UAE) who
purchase the Dutch satellites is not reassuring. It is known, for
example from military considerations that Israel
has invested heavily in observation satellites. The satellites of
the extremely repressive
Singapore among others intended for internal security and "for
military purposes; to know what countries in the region are doing on
land, air and sea." The United Arab Emirates (UAE) are involved
in the dirty war against the current regime in Yemen. That earth
observation could play a role in this war is indisputable.
The
market for small satellites is growing rapidly and not all satellites
have a military application. Most get a civil destination, others a
dual function for both civilian and military applications.

Unfortunately, it is unclear for what purpose the Dutch exports are
ment, because descriptions like 'Earth observation' and especially
'Testing new technologies' (China) and 'Rresearch in space' (US) are
extremely vague. In this way, transparency is not very informative.
The type name of the satellites should be mentioned to give society a
possibility to assess on these growing exports, also for military
purposes.